Moonlight and Mists
by DezoPenguin
Summary: An anthology collection of my various short stories that take place in the Ravenloft and Masque of the Red Death fantasy horror settings.  Hopefully, they'll send a shiver or two down your spine for this Halloween!
1. A Gentleman by Moonlight

_A/N: It's the Halloween season, one of my favorites of the year. As my regular readers know, I do rather enjoy Gothic horror, so for this season I thought that I would post a few short stories set in the Ravenloft setting. I've published these online before, at the Fraternity of Shadows (an absolutely wonderful Ravenloft site), but I thought they deserved a larger audience._

~X X X~

"I-it was lying on my desk when I came to work this morning, Chief Constable."

Marcus Bretton, curator of the Martira Bay Museum of the Arts, handed over the stiff buff-colored envelope. It had been slit open, Liem Osgul noted, by a very sharp letter opener, which told him something about Bretton's precise and fastidious nature but nothing about the sender—and it was the sender Chief Constable Osgul wanted, very badly indeed.

The envelope was addressed in a neat copperplate script, in blue-black Valachani ink with a nibbed fountain pen rather than a quill. Unlike his predecessor, Osgul did not know this at a glance; he knew it because there were seven samples with identical handwriting on identical paper in the case file which had been examined by the City Constabulary's forensic investigators. Osgul took out the note inside, which was likewise predictable:

_My dear Mr. Bretton,_

_Please be informed that I shall come for Valdano's _The Sorrows of Ezra_ tonight at the stroke of midnight. Do not feel obligated to offer a welcome._

_Yr. obt. servant,_

_The Moonlight Rogue_

Osgul had expected it. Seven months, seven full moons, and seven thefts. Why stop? The grinning bastard was clearly enjoying his game.

~X X X~

_"What's this?" Inspector Cadmon laughed. "Announcing a theft in advance? Why, the man must be mad! Who's ever heard of such a thing?"_

_"I know, Inspector; I could scarcely believe it myself," Sir Hawthorne said with a grin. "Still and all, I paid over ten thousand in good, hard gold for my wife's emeralds, and I'm not going to ignore any threat, no matter how insane it sounds."_

_"Of course, my lord. I'll assign a pair of constables to stand watch for you. If this 'Moonlight Rogue' dares to make the attempt, we'll show him the hospitality of the City Jail._

~X X X~

"What exactly is _The Sorrows of Ezra_, Mr. Bretton?" Osgul asked. "A painting, a sculpture?"

"A painting, Chief Constable, in oils on canvas. It's this way, in the Long Gallery."

Bretton led Osgul out of the office, down a short hallway, and up a spiral staircase to a long hall that ran across the building on the second floor. The Long Gallery was a hundred and fifty feet long at least, with skylights dotting its high, arched ceilings along the way. Two constables trailed their chief as the curator took them about two-thirds down the gallery.

"Here it is, _The Sorrows of Ezra_, Valdano's masterwork. It was finished just six months before the artist took his own life."

The curator went on with a number of further details about the Borcan painter's history, to which Osgul listened with only half an ear. Nor did he waste much time on the artistic content of the painting of the weeping, white-robed lady with mists and fog swirling at her feet. He was more concerned with practicalities: size, four feet by three, but subtract a foot each way if removed from the rococo, gilt wood frame. One of the skylights was just above the section of corridor where the Valdano was hung.

"So what is it worth—in money, I mean?"

"To a collector...perhaps ten thousand skulls, or more if he has a special interest in the artist or the subject."

"I see. Well worth the Rogue's time, then. He's never gone after anything worth less than five thousand. A connoisseur, our man is. Is it the most valuable piece you have?"

"Oh, no. We passed a Garcia about a dozen yards back which is worth five times this, and there are Har'Akir antiquities on display downstairs as well. Is that important?"

Osgul shrugged.

"Who knows? With someone like the Moonlight Rogue, who can guess why he picks anything in particular? Whatever's driving this one, it's not just about the money."

"I suppose not. I do say, it's a little thrilling, though, isn't it? To be matching one's wits with such a notorious character?"

"Not that I'd say, no."

~X X X~

_"I can't believe it," Cadmon said, hurling his domino mask onto his desk. "After Lady Hawthorne's emeralds last month, we took his threat seriously, believe me. I was there at the masquerade along with four constables, disguised as servants, and he snatched Aria Norin's brooch anyway."_

_"How did he manage it?"_

_"Apparently, he'd found out what costume Mr. Norin would be wearing and prepared a duplicate. Then, while the husband was busy in the card room, he danced with Mrs. Norin and palmed the brooch right off her dress. Of course, when we noticed, he'd made his escape _through_ the card room to the back garden and we ended up trying to arrest the husband!" Cadmon looked like he wanted to spit. "Egg on our faces all around. And to top it all off, do you know what Mrs. Norin said?"_

_"What?"_

_"She said, " Cadmon repeated bitterly, "that she should have known it wasn't her husband under the mask, because he'd never been half so charming."_

~X X X~

"Is there any reason," Osgul asked, "why the Valdano has to be hung here?"

"Excuse me, sir?"

"I mean, is there any reason why you can't just take it off the wall, have it carried down to a storage vault and locked away?"

"Chief Constable! Is that really playing the game?"

Osgul felt the throbbing in his temples start up, the same headache he got every time the Moonlight Rogue's name crossed his desk.

"Game?" he growled. "Did you say game? Hop-scotch and tiddlywinks are games. Chess and death's-head dice are games. Ten thousand skulls' worth of museum property doesn't sound much like a game to me. Perhaps the museum trustees would have a different opinion, though. Shall we go summon them and ask if they agree with your opinion, Curator?"

Bretton quailed before the Chief Constable's glare and his barking voice. It drove him wild, the way that these people seemed to react to the Rogue's threats.

~X X X~

_"I said no, Inspector, and that is that."_

_"But Mr. Beryon, I must urge you. The Ofuda vase would be much easier to protect if locked in your family's strongroom."_

_Beryon glowered at Cadmon, his hirsute brows bristling._

_"Inspector, I have been challenged, openly and fairly, by this Moonlight Rogue. You say that on three previous occasions he has struck at the time indicated, passing up other valuables to take only the single item identified in his message?"_

_"Yes, but that doesn't change—"_

_"I don't expect you to understand, but this is a matter between gentlemen. Honor and pride are involved." Cadmon flushed at the implication that he possessed neither. "I have had the Ofuda vase displayed in this spot in my home for the past year and a half. To shut it up now would be to play foul, and that I will not do. If you wish to catch this Moonlight Rogue, then do so. Guard the vase where it sits and take what precautions you may—but do not expect me to comply with requests that no gentleman would consider."_

~X X X~

"As a matter of fact, Chief Constable," Bretton said hesitantly, "there is a reason why the painting cannot be stored. The Valdano, along with several other works, were part of a bequest to the Museum under the will of the late Grigor Stefanson. Mr. Stefanson was a great patron of the arts, and wished to benefit the public after his death. However, the will contains a clause that should any picture be removed from display for any reason other than a good-faith need for restoration work, ownership would revert to Stefanson's heirs. His stated view was that if the public was not to see the various works, then it was better that his family get the benefit of their monetary worth. The heirs, it may be said, are badly in need of funds and quite aggressive in scrutinizing our use. So I'm afraid that having the Valdano stolen or locking it away to keep it from being stolen will end in the same result so far as the Museum is concerned."

Osgul exhaled through clenched teeth. He was sure, _sure_, damn it, that the Rogue had known about Stefanson's will and had picked this particular painting because of it. The bastard was far too adept at making sure he got to play his game, try his skills against the victim's security and the constabulary.

Bretton's announcement was greeted by a slow, mocking clapping of hands. They all turned to see who was there, and as soon as Osgul identified the person the hot words of protest died on his lips and instead his blood ran cold.

~X X X~

_"Glue."_

_Cadmon winced at his superior's tone. The raw patch on his left cheek made his embarrassment even more obvious, as if he had gotten a head start on a blush of shame._

_"The best efforts of the City Constabulary foiled by a pot of glue."_

_They'd gotten a look at the Rogue this time. Indeed, he'd brazenly shown himself in an entrance as theatrical as anything else about the man. His flowing silk cloak and top hat, combined with his white, full-face mask bearing the visage of a smiling harlequin, made for a striking and dramatic silhouette. They'd given chase—right into the section of hallway he'd prepared in advance. Four constables and the art gallery's docent had stuck fast. Cadmon, straining with extra effort, had pulled his foot out of one boot and as a result fallen over on his side, with the result that it had taken over an hour to extricate him from the glue._

_As always, the Moonlight Rogue had gotten clean away. The gallery's cleaning staff was said to have laughed long and hard at the sight of the cluster of constables' boots left behind._

~X X X~

"Tasya Veron," Osgul said, fighting to keep his voice flat and even.

"You know this woman, Chief Constable?" Bretton asked.

"Kargat," Osgul said. Bretton's rubicund face went ash-pale in an instant at the mention of the feared organization, and both of Osgul's constables shifted nervously in their places. The witch probably enjoyed that.

"Very good, Chief Constable. I'm so happy that you remember me," Veron said. Her smile was as bright as an innocent maiden greeting a long time-friend, and her voice as cold and menacing as the hiss of an adder.

She was an attractive woman, but Osgul found it impossible to think of her in that way; if he saw beauty in her at all it was the beauty of an object, a prized piece of statuary or a masterwork of a longsword. Certainly he had no urge to run his hands through the curling chestnut hair or kiss the full, sensual mouth. The word _Kargat_ alone was enough to chill any romantic thoughts.

Osgul believed Veron was highly ranked among the Martira Bay offices of that fearsome organization, but he could not be sure—Darkon's secret police was no more inclined to share their organizational structure than they were anything else about themselves. While the Constabulary enforced the laws of the Baroness of Martira Bay, the Kargat answered only to Darkon's sovereign, the Wizard-King Azalin. They acted in _his_ name, with the authority so granted.

"What is your errand here, Mistress Veron?"

"Why, the same as yours, Chief Constable. To stop the notorious Moonlight Rogue and put and end to his spree of crime. Thus far, your constables seem unable to do the job."

Osgul flushed with emotion. Was this, he wondered, how Inspector Cadmon had felt three months ago? Helpless, ashamed, and furious all at once, without any way to express those feelings but to swallow them like a bitter draught?

~X X X~

_"Five!" Osgul barked, slamming his fist on the desk. "Five months! Five thefts, regular as clockwork, and what do you have to show for it? Nothing!"_

_Cadmon flinched before his superior's vitriol._

_"The arrogant bastard puts down with pen and ink where and when he'll strike and what he intends to take. It's as good as a formal invitation to the constabulary. And what do you have to show for it? Five failures! Five valuable items stolen! Five times the City Constabulary left standing around with stupid looks on our faces!"_

_"You can't feel any worse about it than me, sir," the Inspector said bitterly._

_"That isn't the point, Cadmon," Osgul snapped. "This isn't about how you feel. The Baroness's law is being flouted. No, worse than that; it's being laughed at, openly and publicly. The man in the street thinks it's all a big joke! The Moonlight Rogue is a hero to them, a bandit who tweaks the noses of the rich and powerful and laughs at the law! They cheer him on, and look forward to the latest story of his exploits! You've gone and given him everything he's wanted."_

_Osgul sighed heavily._

_"We can't have this any more, Cadmon. I'm taking over this case; I have to. You've failed me. What's more, you've failed in the worst possible way. Cases go unsolved now and again, we both know and accept that, but to bring humiliation on the constabulary and the law in this way is impossible. Clear out your desk. You've been demoted back to an ordinary constable."_

_Shock and sudden fear froze Cadmon for an instant as his mind tried to grasp the reality of what had happened._

_"Sir, you...that can't..." He had a family, a wife, a child, another on the way. He needed an officer's added wage to support them, to pay the rent on their home, to buy decent food and clothes. Everything he'd worked for these past twelve years was tumbling down around his ears._

_"You're damned lucky you weren't drummed out entirely!" Osgul shouted in sudden anger. "When people point and laugh at the constabulary, do you think the Baroness will tolerate it?"_

_Cadmon couldn't deny it. Perhaps it was unjust, but there was risk as well as reward with a high-profile case._

_"Look at it this way: in a few weeks I'll count myself lucky if I'm allowed to share a beat with you if I can't make an end to the business. The higher up the ladder, the farther the fall."_

~X X X~

"Please, go on with your planning, Chief Constable," Veron said airily. "I'm all ears to hear what clever schemes you've concocted this time to thwart the Moonlight Rogue. Who knows? Some of them might even work."

Osgul swallowed the bile that rose in his throat. That was how people like the Kargat worked. They picked and picked, prodding a man because he had no choice but to take it, forcing him to stew in the knowledge of their power over him. And if he lost his temper, reacted as if he had a shred of pride left, they wouldn't respect him for standing on his dignity. No, Veron and her ilk would crush him like a bug for his temerity, for daring to stand up for himself.

He wondered if there was anyone, excepting Azalin Rex himself, who could make the Kargat crawl as they did to others.

Veron's eyes narrowed.

"I'm serious, Chief Constable. Go on with your planning. I believe Mr. Bretton had just finished telling us why he can't just lock up the Valdano until tomorrow?"

Osgul was frozen a moment longer with helpless rage, then sighed and did at last what all good soldiers—and all slaves—did. He followed orders.

"Mr. Bretton, would the terms of the will at least allow you to _move_ the painting to a different display location?"

"What? Oh, oh, yes, that would be quite possible."

"Good. That's _something_, at least. If this bastard thinks that we're playing some kind of game then at least we don't have to play by his rules. This room has too many points of entry with those skylights along with the doors at either end. Is there anyplace better? Smaller, with as few doors and windows as possible?"

Bretton's gaze kept flickering from Osgul back to Veron.

"The Chief Constable has asked you a question, Mr. Bretton," she said. "Perhaps you could trouble yourself to answer it?"

Bretton quivered, as well he might, but managed to compose himself long enough to provide an answer.

"The Iseley Room might suit."

"Then let's go take a look at it," Osgul remarked.

~X X X~

_"T-ten thousand skulls?" Lorne Havers quivered as he stared at the imperious dowager._

_"That is the accepted value of Amadon's 'Bloom of the Rose,' is it not?"_

_"Yes, but..."_

_"I graciously lent that sculpture to you for the purpose of the Havers Gallery's gala event. You were a friend of my late husband, so I thought the kindness appropriate. But surely you are not going to claim that you never agreed to give the Amadon _back_, are you?"_

_"No, no, of course it was to be returned, but I don't have it to give back."_

_"I'm aware of that. The Moonlight Rogue's latest theft is all over town. I do not, however, intend to suffer from your lack of security. I lent you the Amadon and it was stolen from your gallery while in your custody. Either return the sculpture or compensate me with its value in money. The law will support me in this."_

_"But I don't _have_ ten thousand! The gallery is mortgaged to the hilt! The gala was to be my chance to attract buyers, but because of the theft it had to be postponed."_

_"Mr. Havers, I am not interested in excuses. If you do not want to end up in debtor's prison, then I suggest you pay me."_

_She left him then, left him to bury his face in his hands and weep over the ruin of his life._

~X X X~

"Yes, this will be much better," Osgul decided, looking around the Iseley Room. It was a medium-sized room paneled in dark wood, with a low ceiling, vaguely like a parlor or study in a manor house. Potted plants in marble vases stood in each corner, adding color to the room. There were two tall windows set in one wall, to the left-hand side of the entry door. It could have been considerably worse as a defensible point, Osgul thought, especially since the windows and doors were on adjoining rather than opposite walls, so it was possible for guards in the room to watch all points of entry at once.

"All right, then," he announced. "Here's what we'll do. Mr. Bretton, have the Valdano brought here and hung on that wall, there." He pointed to the spot in question, which was occupied by a painting of roughly the same size. "Then take that one upstairs and put it where the Valdano is now."

"But, Chief Constable, this is only a Corbeil. It does not belong in the Long Gallery."

Osgul ground his teeth.

"Mr. Bretton, do I look like a man who is concerned with the artistic implications of the museum displays?"

"N-no, sir."

"Precisely."

"T-then why not just store the Corbeil until tomorrow?"

"Bait, Mr. Bretton," Veron spoke up. "Our dear Chief Constable is setting a trap for the Moonlight Rogue and a blank spot on the wall is not going to lure even the most inept of thieves."

"Oh. Oh! Yes, I see, now."

"How nice for you. Haslett, go with Mr. Bretton and make sure everything gets done," Osgul ordered.

"Yes, sir," the constable said sharply.

"Jesso," he addressed the other constable, "get back to the City Jail and bring up Lieutenant Wayes, Sergeant Grove, and five constables." He'd leave four armed guards protecting the Valdano with instructions not to leave the Iseley Room regardless of any distraction the Rogue might arrange. Treachery and stealth were a thief's stock-in-trade; the thing to do was make him compete on the level of brute force if he wanted the painting.

That, though, was only if he managed to get past what Osgul had planned for him in the Long Gallery. Let him get out of _that_ snare, if he could.

~X X X~

_"It was a week past rent-day," the old beldame of a landlady said. "I came up to tell him he could pay me in full or get out! Two months behind, now. I've been patient, haven't I? I knew he was out of work, gave him extra time, didn't I?"_

_"I'm sure you've been the soul of patience," Constable Veen said dryly. The hag seemed to be doing her cringing best to deny any responsibility for what lay within. "However, we are not. Open the door."_

_She hastened to comply, fumbling to fit her key to the lock, but got the door open at the last._

_It was a cheerless garret, with cheap, well-used furniture that was old without being antique. A single small statue of Ezra made the only personal touch. It looked lost and forlorn in the gray, bleak room._

_Veen found it a fitting milieu for the suicide._

_The tenant had been an old man, nearly seventy, with thinning hair and a fringe of white beard. The cut in his left wrist was deep, that on the right wrist less so, since the hand that had made it had already been wounded. The blood made for the only brightness, the only color in the room._

_"He looks familiar," Veen's partner, Nalis, remarked with surprise. "I've seen him somewhere before."_

_"Oh?"_

_Nalis snapped her fingers sharply._

_"I remember, now. He was Avahn Jolstead's valet. I saw him when we investigated the Moonlight Rogue's fifth crime. Jolstead thought this fellow had given the Rogue information about the location of his hidden safe. He was the only servant to know where it was concealed behind a panel in the bedroom."_

_Veen snorted._

_"Like a thief couldn't find that."_

_"That's what Cadmon said, but Jolstead had already sacked the valet without a character." She looked down at the corpse sadly. "At his age, and with no references, he must have been unable to find a new post."_

_"And when the money ran out..."_

_The constables glanced at one another, the down at the open clasp-knife still cradled in the corpse's fingers._

~X X X~

"There's nothing worse than guard duty on a night when you think something might happen," muttered Constable Jamison, fingering the hilt of his sword. "You have to keep your eyes open, your mind focused, always at attention. Hours of it, the dull, boring sameness—yet knowing that at some point you'll have to leap into action, and that if you let your mind drift, _that's_ when it'll be too late."

"Don't be such a worrier," said Haslett. "We won't even see any action tonight. The only question is whether the Chief Constable and the men he's got upstairs will bring in the Rogue or not."

"Jamison's right," snapped Lieutenant Wayes. "It's our job to make sure the Rogue doesn't get the painting. The worm's been clever enough to escape traps before. We're here as a second level of defense."

The first tolling chime of a tower clock striking midnight from two blocks away could be heard.

"That's it, then," Wayes said. "He always comes at midnight like his notes brag. Keep a sharp eye out."

"Lieutenant..." Jamison began, then sniffed experimentally at the air. "Do you smell something funny?"

Wayes sniffed too. Yes, he could smell something, a sharp scent, acrid.

"What _is_ that? It almost—"

He never finished the thought; his head swam and then darkness claimed him. The three constables likewise slumped to the floor, so his audience wouldn't have heard him in any case.

~X X X~

The man who called himself the Moonlight Rogue chuckled behind his mask as he saw the slumbering forms of the four men laid out in their drugged slumber. How predictable was a constable's mind! He'd been sure they'd move the painting to a more defensible location, and nearly as sure they'd pick the Iseley Room as best fitting the criteria. That was why he'd planted his little surprise there when he'd left his note for the curator: time-fused capsules of an anesthetic gas. When an acid ate its way through a plug—a process that would take a known time—the drug was released.

Of course, he thought as he listened to the chiming clock, down-to-the-minute timing wasn't possible, but the gas was effective for as long as an hour. That it had incapacitated the guards precisely at midnight was only one more of the strokes of good luck that had blessed him.

But now—to work!

He smashed the window glass, reached in, and turned the lock. He then slid the window up and crept inside. The painting was bulky, and would be hard to carry away as is, but he could fix that. He took out a sharp blade and with deft, sure strokes excised the canvas from the frame. He then rolled the canvas up, inserted it into a rigid tube, and slung the tube across his back on a strap. Then it was back out the window and up the rope to the museum roof.

He laughed again when he regained the roof. Another victory for the Moonlight Rogue! It was heady stuff, another win at the game between himself and the law. His only real regret was that it had all been over so quickly. An extended chase, a trap to spring, that always got his blood moving.

"Ah, well," he said aloud, "it isn't my fault that they went and set a trap for me in the wrong room." He unhooked his climbing-rope and wound it around his waist for easy transport.

"Of course it is."

A hand like iron fell on his shoulder, the nails cutting through the cape and the leather beneath to jab at flesh. It spun him away from the street, and a blow was delivered to his sternum that knocked him, gasping and choking, to the slightly canting, red-tiled roof of the museum. His chest throbbed where he'd been struck as if his attacker had used a cudgel or leaded cane, which made it all the more shocking to see not an armed guard or constable but a pretty, chestnut-haired woman who'd have been an ornament to any ballroom.

"My dear," he said urbanely, "you seem to have me at a disadvantage."

"That was my intent," replied the woman.

She was next to him, then, though he'd barely seen her move. With a flick of her hand his mask was torn away.

"I think I know that face," she said, tapping her full lower lip with a fingernail in a parody of a thoughtful mien. A pink tongue emerged and flicked away the traces of blood left from when she'd clawed his shoulder. "Sir Val'Kainen's youngest boy, I believe."

Aric Val'Kainen struggled to keep his composure. His heart was racing, pounding against the sore muscles of his chest as if it would burst from within. And yet, he was thrilled as well. This was the first time he'd ever had hands laid on him, and now his identity exposed. The game had reached new heights. He just had to play it out, as he always had.

He managed to put his most dazzling smile on his face. "At your service, milady. Might I have the honor of your own name as well?"

"Tasya Veron," she replied with an impish grin, and then her face went hard as stone. "Kargat."

She pulled him to his feet, then pivoted and pinned him against a chimney with her hand on his chest. Her strength was enormous, unnatural; magic was obviously involved.

"Bad enough," she said, leaning in so the breath from her words tickled his ear, "that you are a thief. Worse for you that you openly mock King Azalin's law while so doing, turning the City Constabulary into the clowns and buffoons in your own little Harlequinade. Buffoons they may be, but they mean order and law to the herd and you foment rebellion by making them seem stupid."

Her voice was soft, like a lover's, but with a cruel harshness to it that chilled him.

"Worst of all, though, is that you are a nobleman of Darkon. Your very existence stands for order. Your fancy education, your pretty clothes, your comfortable life that gives rise to the boredom your antics seek to slake, they were all purchased with that duty—and you have Not. Kept. Faith."

With a sudden, convulsive movement, Veron's hand punched forward, fingers piercing leather and flesh, tearing through ribs and sternum. Aric's scream gagged on the rush of blood filling his throat. She could sense he was still alive as she lifted him, turned, and hurled his body away, but the spark of life had faded before Aric crashed into one of the skylights overlooking the Long Gallery and plunged through with a shower of glass. Maybe Osgul could at least make sure the corpse didn't get away.

A moment later the roof was empty but for the moonlight and the soft whisper of a bat's wings flitting away.

~X X X~

_A/N: I enjoy a good caper story as much as the next guy, but I've never been fond of the "Gentleman Rogue" genre—the Raffles or Arsene Lupin type of character who steals from the rich and sticks the profits in their own pockets. In presenting the Rogue as a hero, the usual contrast is to compare them to their victims: arrogant fat-cats who deserve what they get, or else "sporting gentlemen" who consider it a game between property owner and crook. What never gets considered is the "peripheral costs" the Rogue inflicts on society, so I thought that I would explore that issue on the way to the end...and of course Ravenloft was the perfect place to put it, since the exploits of a thief would never be an innocent game in the Demiplane of Dread..._


	2. The Master of Dmitrovich

_A/N: This story is set in the "Masque of the Red Death" setting, on Gothic Earth—essentially, a world like our own, but where the Red Death has brought to life the legends and stories of Gothic fiction._

~X X X~

Dusk was falling. Erik Lehmann reckoned that night would not be upon him for another hour, but even that was not enough time to reach his intended destination by morning. Not for the first time he cursed the fates that brought him to this God-forsaken province of the empire, where the peasants were more familiar with their own Slavic tongues than the German of the empire's heart, and where the comforts of the capital were no more than a dream. A light drizzle was falling, too, and Erik was confronted with the thought of riding for at least two hours over bad, unfamiliar roads in pitch blackness, the clouds denying him even the guiding light of the moon.

He had gone by a side track a few hundred yards back which, he knew, led to what passed for a noble's estate in this district. It was one of the few places he did know of, as the villagers has been very careful to point it out to him at the inn where he had slept the night before. The path lay just past the crossroads, where the hanged body of a thief still twisted on its rope as a lesson to all. A macabre sight, but this was a harsh land with harsh justice, where the armies of Austrians, Russians, and Turks had clashed, and a dozen other races as well, until the blood-soaked ground seemed to breed violence in and of itself. When it was not the conquering foe, it was the iron grip of the _boyar_, or the taxes of the crown, or the bandits who lurked in the shadows cast by the endless warfare. Or, all else failing, there was the wolf.

The howls always began at twilight, and they were beginning now, the mournful cries of one beast to another. The wolves of this country were not like those of other lands; lack of game had left them half-starved for generations and bred a desperate viciousness deep into their bones. Erik was prepared for a confrontation with man or beast, but the growing nervousness of his horse at the wolf cries might deny him the chance to use the sword that hung at his left hip, or the double-barreled horse pistol in the saddle holster. The concern settled the matter for him; he turned the horse about and headed towards the track leading to the Dmitrovich estate.

It was clearly superstition that led the villagers to warn Erik away from the place and to speak in harsh whispers of its lord, called only the Master of Dmitrovich. A harsh ruler would not have etched fear into the hearts of these phlegmatic people, so that only left the legends of black magic, ghosts, vampires, and werewolves that infested the province. A man with the devil in him might well become truly the Devil in the eyes of the peasants with a coincidence or two combined with a few vicious lies. Erik was not there, though, to criticize the practices of the Master of Dmitrovich in his own home. He merely wanted shelter for the night.

Fortunately, the track was easy to find even going towards the village instead of departing. It wasn't much of a road, more a stretch of ground where horses and men had passed for decades, perhaps centuries, flattening out the underbrush over and over until it died, leaving only a bare path worn with the ruts of wagon wheels. The ground was even softer than on the main road, and Erik's roan kicked up clots of muddy earth with every step. The trail wound through a dense knot of trees, and the nobleman thought he saw low, black forms slinking in and out among the trucks. His horse was trembling beneath him, and he closed his hand around the butt of his pistol, ready to draw and use it.

Then, all of a sudden, three forms burst from the trees, three brutes whose hunger had driven them into a frenzy of bloodlust, unconcerned that horse and rider were both healthy and strong. The roan knew that despite its size and strength, its natural place in the world was as prey, and moreover that there was no herd of its kind around to fight alongside, and it bolted, following the trail towards the estate simply because it was the path of least resistance. The wolves followed without thought, consumed only by hunger, the brutal pain that ate at their bellies.

Erik jerked the pistol from its holster and let off a quick shot, but the crazed rush of his horse caused the shot to go wide. The wolves were snapping at the panic-stricken roan's flanks, and Erik forced his nerves and hand to steady, taking careful aim. His second shot went true, and a wolf dropped out of the chase, stung by the pain of its wound into sense. The Austrian jammed the now-empty pistol back into its holster and drew his sword, lashing at the remaining two brutes as if the blade was a whip. The analogy wasn't bad, for the narrow smallsword, so excellent at dispatching a man with the latest fencing techniques, could deliver no more than stinging cuts to the wolves who would not stay still to receive a serious thrust.

Then, the trees opened up into a cleared area, and Erik saw ahead of him on an ancient, broken wall pierced by an archway, and beyond it, shrouded in twilight and mist, the stone-walled bulk of the Dmitrovich manor. The horse saw it too, and seemed to take strength from the sight, opening up distance between it and the wolves. Erik made for the arch, and spying a man just inside he shouted, "Close the gate!" as the roan plunged into the courtyard.

The man, a broad-shouldered, black-bearded fellow wearing dull brown huntsman's leathers, only laughed mockingly. Reining his horse in, Erik could see why. The arch had once contained a latticed iron gate, but sometime in the past half of it had been torn from its hinges and still lay rusting on the broken flagstones of the courtyard. Besides which, there were any number of places where the outer wall had been broken in and would freely admit man or beast alike. Erik was ready for a last stand, and noted with relief that the huntsman had both a heavy iron-studded cudgel and a long knife hanging at his belt, but strangely the wolves had not pursued the rider through the arch. Instead, they slunk back and forth on their bellies outside the wall, whining like whipped curs.

The huntsman laughed again, an arrogant, barking voice.

"Don't worry, man. We have no trouble with wolves here." He glanced Erik over, taking in the quality of his clothing, horse, and tack, then said, "My pardon, lord. We don't get many gentlemen here. If you'll let me see to your horse, I'm sure the Master will receive you."

The roan's flanks were heaving and its lips flecked with foam from the hard ride. Erik nodded his thanks, the put his sword away and dismounted. The huntsman took the reins in a firm grip and pointed towards the manor.

"Just knock at the door, lord, and you'll be taken care of."

The incident with the wolves had disturbed the Austrian more than he liked to admit. The risk of death was bad enough, but he had faced it before, in duels and while hunting predatory creatures, and had always kept his nerve as befit a man of his station. The way the wolves had stopped at the estate's borders, though, had been another thing entirely. Erik would have sworn that nothing short of death or serious injury would have driven off the hunger-maddened brutes, and yet the huntsman had not even had to strike a blow. With incidents such as this, it was not surprising that the locals had let their superstitious beliefs fasten upon the estate and its lord.

Shaking off his lingering doubts, Erik turned his attention to the manor. Unlike the outer wall, the stone keep appeared to be in good repair. The walls were weathered and in many places overgrown with ivy, but seemed sound, as did what he could see of the gabled roofs. The basic design appeared to be of a large, square tower, which past the second or third story divided itself, some parts roofed over while others continued to rise. The right-hand rear quarter was the tallest portion, as well as the only part topped with crenelations rather than a wooden roof. There were few windows, all high up, giving the lower portion of the manor the appearance of a great stone block. Altogether, it was a grim and foreboding place, but to Erik it was much less so than the nighttime woods. He stepped up to the doors and took one of the heavy iron rings mounted in lion's mouths and loudly knocked four times.

There was a long silence, then the sound of heavy bolts being drawn back, and finally one of the doors creaked open. A servant in gold-embroidered gray livery stood inside. He was an older man, in his mid-fifties perhaps, with hair and beard the color of dull steel, but his build was as powerful as the huntsman's. The Master of Dmitrovich might not have armies at his beck and call as had his forbears, but he still could call on a strong force if he had need, Erik observed.

"Yes, lord?" asked the majordomo. He had taken in the Austrian's status at once, but there was no servility in his voice. Erik had learned that a confident servant implied a powerful master, who lent his strength to his underlings.

"I am a traveler, caught between towns. I had hoped to find shelter here at the home of a fellow noble."

The gray-haired majordomo nodded.

"Of course, lord. The Master always welcomes travelers of rank and good breeding. Please, enter."

Erik stepped through the door into a towering entry hall, from which two staircases rose to a balustraded landing that ran along the back wall. The floor was a mosaic of colored tiles depicting a lion with a serpent caught in its claws and teeth, likely some kind of armorial bearing. The majordomo led him to a small reception room, where he could await the Master of Dmitrovich's pleasure.

"The Master will join you for dinner, lord. If I may have your name so I may announce you?"

"Certainly. I am Erik Lehmann."

The gray-haired man nodded.

"Once more thing, lord." He reached out a hand. "I will need your sword. In this country, a man does not come armed to his host's table. It will be returned to you when you depart, of course."

The Austrian's eyes narrowed, but he decided that in this war-torn district there might be such a custom, though in truth he had suspected the opposite. This was a nobleman's home, not a gambling den in the back streets of Paris or Vienna where to go unarmed was to surrender one's life. He unbuckled the sheath from his belt and handed the blade to the servant. As he did so, a chill seemed to pass through him.

The Austrian was led through the entry hall and upstairs to a cavernous dining room. The place was a virtual armory, with ranks of spears and shields and heavy broadswords on the walls. The massive wooden table stretched nearly the length of the room. At the far end of the table sat a man, but next to him stood a woman in a simple white dress who caught Erik's attention as he approached. She had chestnut hair that tumbled down her back and glittering green eyes, and was possessed of an extraordinary grace and beauty. The man, though, made a slight gesture and the woman departed at once. Then, the man rose from his seat, and all Erik's awareness was focused on him.

He was a tall man and broad-shouldered, but without the animal burliness of the servants. In a way, he was a reversed image of his guest, dark-haired and -eyed while Erik was fair with blue eyes, but with the same strong, dextrous body and clean-shaven good looks. His face was perhaps more predatory, his eyes harder, but then he was ruler here and Erik was not. He wore black, set off by a white shirt and cravat, while an emerald ring set in heavy, medieval-looking gold adorned his hand.

This, quite clearly, was the Master of Dmitrovich.

"Good evening, Herr Lehmann," he greeted Erik in lightly accented German rather than the local tongue spoken by the servants. "I am Pyotr Dmitrovich. Welcome to my home."

He extended his hand to the Austrian, who took it. Surprisingly, his grip was harder, much more forceful than Erik's strength could match.

"Thank you, my lord. I appreciate your hospitality."

"Not at all. Please, sit." A place had been laid, the table service of ancient gold. Erik sat, and the host took his place next to him at the head of the table.

"You are not dining?" Erik asked.

"No; we dine early here, and of course had no expectation that I would have a guest for dinner." He removed the cover from a tray, and the succulent aroma of a beef roast filled the guest's nostrils. Erik ate heartily, washing it down with a strong red wine.

"So," the Master inquired, "what brings a gentleman from the capital to this dark corner of the Emporer's domains? As I am sure my servants have mentioned, it is not often that I have visitors of noble rank; even less often those from as far away as you."

"My father is Konrad Lehmann, the Baron von Falkenheim. He is afflicted with too many sons, so since my elder brother will inherit the baronial estates, Father chose to settle upon me a small manor and lands in the Balkans that he won at cards. If I administer it well, then not only shall I be spared the rigors of being a poor relation or the uncertain chances of an army career, but I will also have a legacy to leave to my own children, should I be blessed with any."

The Master's lip curled scornfully.

"The most valuable of all possessions—land to rule!—and it is just handed to you. A prize won by gambling, nonetheless, rather than being carved out by blood and steel."

He paused for a moment. Erik drank more of the wine, wishing to keep an even temper while he was enjoying this man's hospitality. It proved to be the correct decision.

"Forgive me," the lord said. "You cannot be blamed for your good fortune. In truth, my contempt should be directed to the one who wagered and lost his birthright to your father. An estate is a sacred trust, a responsibility to your ancestors who earned it and to your descendants who will rule it in turn."

"Have you sons, my lord?"

The dark-haired man's face grew bleak.

"I have neither wife nor heir," he said. "My family is many years gone; I am the last of my ancient race."

"Then, the lady I saw earlier..."

"Tanya? A woman, no more," the Master replied with a dismissive gesture. The Austrian understood at once; she was undoubtedly the lord's mistress, likely a village girl claimed by the _boyar_. "No, all I can do is to preserve this land as best I may, until the day finally comes when time does what Magyar, Turk, Prussian, and a dozen others could not and lays low the Dmitrovich line. I intend," he added, his eyes blazing, "to make certain Death has a hard fight."

There was little Erik could say to that. In its way, it was tragic, the end of a once-glorious family. The signs of old wealth he had observed stemmed, he guessed, from the days before the war years, before the province had become so wracked by poverty. The Dmitrovich estates were no longer productive; only brutal discipline and harsh taxes could maintain the keep, let alone improve it or provide for major repairs.

A man forced to such measures could well find himself the focus of superstitious fear. Especially when incidents such as that with the wolves took place around his home. The way the two beasts had given up the pursuit at the gate had been uncanny, defying at least on the surface any logical explanation.

"The village," Erik asked, "is that yours as well?"

"It is; its citizens are my tenants, and most farm my fields besides. They work well enough, though they let their minds be dulled by foolish beliefs." He laughed harshly. "For example, do you know they garland their doors with wolfsbane to keep the wolves away?" The Master laughed again. "Imagine, thinking a starving beast would be held off by a few herbs waved under its nose. The only real antidotes are sharp steel and a good firearm, and sometimes not even then. When hunger is in one's belly, tearing away like a raging demon consuming one from the inside out, not even death is always proof against it."

He smiled at Erik, looking almost half-wolf himself with his predatory face and fine, sharp white teeth. It almost seemed as if he had read the Austrian's mind, and brought up that particular superstition because of it. Despite himself, Erik felt a faint chill trickle along his spine.

"No doubt, Herr Lehmann, you will find many similar experiences to be yours when you take possession of your own estate."

Did he mean the wolf chase? No, Erik thought, that was absurd. Of course his host referred to the superstitions the Austrian's own tenants would follow, causing amusement and frustration in equal measure for him. Erik could not allow himself to be unnerved by wild stories and the Master's often off-putting manner.

They talked for perhaps an hour more, with the host ruthlessly dictating the flow of the conversation. He spoke of the wars that had been fought in the district, and how the first Dmitrovich had won a glorious victory over the Turks to bring him his lands and title.

"So you see, we Dmitrovichs were born in bloodshed, from the first to be master here to me, and all that lie in between us." There was a heavy resonation in his voice, traces of bitter emotion that suggested a double meaning somewhere, though Erik could not discern it.

He rose then from the table, as if embarrassed somehow or aware that he'd said more than he'd intended.

"I have found your company most pleasant, Herr Lehmann, but I must beg your forgiveness once again for keeping you so late when no doubt you are tired from your journey. I will have Ivan show you to your room." It was clearly a dismissal rather than an offer made from kindness, the lord banishing the now-unwanted presence from his sight.

The servant Ivan proved to be the majordomo, who led Erik through shadowy halls, a silver-chased lantern providing shifting illumination that hinted at phantoms lurking at the corners of Erik's vision. The guest room proved to be in the tower portion of the manor. Like the other rooms Erik had seen, it bore the unmistakable imprint of faded glory. The furniture was all antique, and had accumulated a number of scuffs and nicks over the years, while the heavy brocade bed-hangings and the Turkish carpet were both worn by time. The bed was made up with fresh linen, though, and there was an ewer of water for washing as well as a carafe of wine set out on a night-table. In addition to these signs of hospitality, Erik's saddlebags had been brought up by the Master's servants. He was thankful for that, since his shaving kit and other toilet articles were kept there.

"I trust this will be acceptable, lord?" Ivan asked.

Erik nodded.

"Yes, quite." In fact, the room was vastly more luxurious than his previous several nights' lodgings. The only thing lacking that the Austrian could see was that there was no mirror to shave or dress by.

"Good." Ivan lit Erik's bedside candle from his lantern. "Sleep well, lord." The gray-haired servant then departed, closing the door behind him. As massive as all the others in the ancient house, it swung closed like that of a prison cell slamming into place.

Left alone in the nearly dark room, the Austrian found himself growing suddenly tired, as if the events of the day were finally catching up to him all at once. He quickly readied for sleep, not even bothering to remove shirt and breeches, blew out the candle, and fell almost at once into a fitful sleep. Vivid dreams assailed his mind, but did not linger long enough to survive his waking. All he was left with was the sense that they had been pleasant, yet with an underlying bitterness that left him cold, almost repulsed, like the adulterer or drunkard who wallows in fleshly pleasures yet feels the sting of conscience. This emotional impression was all that he was left with, though; all specific details were swept aside as he found himself being shaken awake. Erik's eyes opened to find himself staring into the green gaze of the chestnut-haired woman he had seen with the Master before dinner.

_Tanya, he said her name was_, he thought. Not a woman, either, but barely more than a girl, nineteen or twenty at most. There was worry in her eyes and fear etched into her face.

"Oh, please, Herr Lehmann, wake up," she begged. "You have to help me. I can't do it alone."

Erik sat up and removed her hands from his shoulders. He could not help but hold them for a moment longer than necessary; they were soft and delicate, just like she herself was.

"Is your name Tanya?" he asked.

Daylight, the cold, pale illumination of an overcast day, was filtering through the room's single window.

"Yes, yes, but please, listen to me!"

She looked to be on the verge of hysteria. Erik pitied her, would have pitied anyone reduced to such a state, but felt little interest in her problem.

"Miss, if you have had some quarrel with the Master of Dmitrovich, please leave me out of it. I am a guest here, no more."

Tanya stared at him, stricken.

"A quarrel? Is that what you think? Herr Lehmann, the Master plans to kill me, to...feast on my blood!"

The girl's claim stunned Erik. He certainly hadn't expected accusations of that nature. An appeal to chivalry, perhaps, to take her away from a cruel lover, but not a blatant assertion that her life was threatened. The talk about blood-drinking, too, seemed born of pure insanity.

"Do you mean that he practices some kind of devil worship? That he murders women and uses their blood in perverted rites?" It sounded positively inane as he said it, and he could not but think that kind of idea would have more life in village superstitions than reality. Still, there had been occasions, some proven and even more rumored, of gruesome acts, Black Masses and the like, in Europe's greatest capitals, let alone this bleak district.

"No, no! Don't you understand?" Tanya pleaded. "The Master is...is a vampire!"

The Austrian stared at the girl, bewildered. A vampire? A walking corpse that sustained itself by consuming living blood? Did she truly believe it was so? Did she think she could convince _him_, not raised on local terrors of the Master, that it was true?

And yet, now that the word had been said aloud, Erik could not keep every image, every bogey-story and folktale he'd heard about the unholy things from boiling up in his mind. There were many things said to mark the vampire apart from living men. They were supposed to have supernatural strength; Erik recalled the power of the Master's grip. Something, too, about mirrors...yes, he remembered, vampires were not supposed to cast a reflection in one. It was a good reason to remove all mirrors from the manor, so one would not inadvertently give himself away. And weren't the blood-drinking devils supposed to be able to command beasts? Hadn't he himself been herded to Dmitrovich manor by the wolves?

"You must be insane," he snapped, and pushed her away from the bed. Yet was she the mad one, or he? He could not shake loose the idea now that it had been planted, as if some devilish power—or a natural instinct for survival—had rooted it there. "If that were true, he'd be off resting in his grave now that it's daylight."

"Yes, yes, and I can show you where it is!"

She was offering to show him evidence? If the Master was, in truth, resting in some tomb now it would be proof, if not necessarily of vampirism, then at least of a perverse, probably insane twist of mind. Yet, might it not also be some sort of trap, a lure to get the Austrian to take Tanya's side against her lover's? If he accepted her offer, she might lead him to a treasure-vault or other private part of the manor, prompting a challenge between Dmitrovich and Erik. Any explanation Erik tried to give would sound absurd—spying to see if his host was a night-walker?

"Tanya," he asked suspiciously," if that is true, then why haven't you destroyed him yourself while he sleeps? Or better yet, why not simply escape during the day?"

She shook her head sadly.

"I cannot do either, not without help. Since he cannot defend himself during daylight hours, he leaves his men on guard, strong men who would kill for pleasure, let alone for the money he pays them. As for escape, the Master not only has his huntsmen, but also the forest wolves under his command. I once saw a kitchen servant try to flee, and he was torn apart by the beasts while the guards just watched and laughed. I might slip past the men, but never the wolves!"

She was all but hysterical with fear. Had Erik not had his own weird experience with the wolves he might have disbelieved her utterly, and even so suspicions about the girl's sanity were presenting themselves. Even so, as the Austrian met Tanya's pleading eyes, he found he did not wish to think of her as either a deceiver or insane.

He leaned forward, intent on taking her hand and saying something soothing, but she gave a little gasp and shied away, pressing the back of her hand to her lips.

"What? What's wrong?"

"Your throat!" she managed to say, pointing.

Dread filled the Austrian as he realized what she must mean. He went to his saddlebags, rummaging through them until he had found his small shaving mirror. Erik examined his neck closely in the glass, looking at the area around his collar that the movement of his head had revealed to the girl. It did not take long to find the two small puncture marks. They were clearly wounds rather than sores or insect bites, and they had not been there, he was sure, the night before. Erik's knowledge of vampire legends was only casual, from spooky tales told over drinks late at night, but he recognized the signs of an attack.

"He...he must have fed on your blood during the night," Tanya said, finding her voice.

"I'm lucky to be alive," Erik murmured.

"No, the Master will take several days, perhaps as long as a week to kill you. As he will no doubt do to me, when he tires of my company."

"I have to destroy him now, don't I? With the taint of his bite on me, I'll become...like him whether he kills me himself or not, whether I die now or later?" There was no question of disbelief now. The new evidence had convinced Erik as soundly as was possible without actually seeing the vampire there before him.

"Yes, yes, that's true," Tanya said at once, then after a moment's bitter silence went on to say, "No, that would be a lie. In truth, I don't know. He doesn't tell me such things. I want you to help me, not run, but...I can't swear that you would take any lasting harm."

"It's a lot to gamble over. My life, my immortal soul...I don't see as how I have any choice but to help you."

"Thank God for your courage," she said earnestly.

Erik dressed quickly. Time was of the essence, for only during daylight hours was the vampire vulnerable.

"I wish I had my sword," he said, feeling as if he were naked, to commence a dangerous mission with no weapon. Ironically, the saddlebags held the powder horn and shot for his pistol, but the gun itself was still in its holster wherever the tack had been stored.

"I tried to get it for you," Tanya told him, "but I couldn't get into Ivan's locked room. I did manage to steal these from the kitchens, though."

He turned; she was holding two bulbs of garlic in her outstretched hand. Erik remembered that the scent of that plant or its flowers was supposed to be noxious and repulsive to vampires. Indeed, there was supposed to be a whole apparatus of holy and herbal remedies to vampiric evil, few of which he remembered. Who'd have thought he'd be trusting his life to half-remembered folktales and bogey stories? He accepted one bulb, then pressed Tanya to keep the other for herself

"Keep that; you may need it to protect yourself." She smiled gratefully at him, and he was struck once more by just how lovely and feminine she appeared. Her full, red lips were slightly parted, and looked as if they would be delightful to kiss. No wonder the Master of Dmitrovich, vampire or no, had been tempted by her; Erik was tempted herself. Anything of that nature, though, would have to wait until more pressing matters were dealt with.

He put the remaining garlic into his belt pouch. He had some vague idea of using it not only for personal protection, but also to close off a room as a trap or something of that nature against the Master.

"I'll still need a weapon, though," he said, "especially if I intend to fight my way past any guards." An idea came to him. "Well, if the Master will take my weapons, then I shall just have to take one of his." The dining room had any number of perfectly good weapons hanging on its walls. He only hoped that the servants on guard didn't have firearms.

"Tanya," he asked, "do you know your way around the castle?"

"I know it fairly well," she replied. "I've been here for almost a month."

"Then you had best come along and be my guide; I could wander through here for hours and never even find the crypt you mentioned."

The girl nodded. There was fear in her expression, but also an eagerness to take action, and even a little hope, as if she finally felt that she had a chance to escape the fate that had seemingly been mapped out for her.

"All right, then; let's go."

They crept through the castle halls without benefit of candle or lantern, relying only on the illumination of the sun through the few windows and the occasional lamps that were kept burning in the gloomier corridors. A light of their own would mark them, catching the eye of any of the _boyar's_ men. Twice they were forced to draw back into the shadows and hope when a servant passed nearby. A fight—perhaps a shouted alarm—would doom their chances. Their luck held, though, and they made it to the dining room.

Close examination of the various weapons revealed that they had been meticulously cared for, kept sharpened and rust-free. Erik's first instinct was to take a sword, but as he started to lift down a heavy twelfth-century blade, he realized that they were designed for a completely different style of fighting than a modern weapon. The massive broadsword was meant to deliver great hacking strokes to slash through an enemy's armor. Erik had been trained in fencing with a light blade designed to thrust at an unarmored opponent's vital organs and to make quick parries as his primary defense. The oldest of the swords on display were so dedicated to slashing and cleaving that they were crafted with a blunt tip. Even those with sharp points were much too heavy to wield as he had been taught.

With that in mind, Erik selected a spear instead. He could thrust with it, or use it like a staff and deliver clubbing blows. Besides, he though, if he was going to be using an unfamiliar weapon, he could at least pick one with the longest reach. It was odd how the feel of the heavy wooden pole in his hands lent him confidence, despite his lack of expertise.

"It's time to go to the crypt," he told Tanya.

"All right. It's underneath the castle; the stairs lead down from the old chapel."

She led the Austrian down to the first floor and into the large room that in past years had been the religious center of the castle. The chapel had long since been abandoned; unlike the rest of the keep there had not even been a pretense of keeping it in good repair. The wooden pews were rotting away; some had already caved in. The crucifix that had once hung over the altar and other signs of faith had been taken away or smashed; whether this was because the Master was a blasphemous man, or because there was truth in the story that holy objects offered protection against vampires Erik did not know.

Tanya pointed out an archway in the wall behind the altar. There was no door, only a faint flicker of light from below.

"The stairs go down to a kind of guard room," she said. "A man is always there during the daytime, and he's always armed."

Erik steeled himself for the battle he knew would come.

"We've been lucky so far," he told the girl. The growing hope in her eyes was like a spur, prodding the Austrian onward. He did not want to see this beauty's spirit crusted, her blood drained to slake the thirst of the vampire Master. "Let's hope it continues that way."

He started down the ancient stone stairs, keeping his steps as light as possible so as not to alert the guard. Tanya followed him, her soft slippers completely silent, only the whisper of her skirts making any sound at all. At the base of the stairs was a small room, with another stairway descending from the left-hand wall. A wooden table bore a brass lantern that flickered dully and a flask which likely contained wine or spirits. The only other item of furniture was a chair, in which sat the guard. It was the huntsman Erik had met outside the castle, still armed with a cudgel and knife.

The guard vaulted to his feet as Erik rushed him; he jumped back from the spear point and clawed the studded club free from his belt. Erik feinted and jabbed at him, trying to keep the huntsman away so he would be unable to use his weapon. It was a good strategy, but the Austrian's inexperience with his weapon betrayed him. He thrust too far as the huntsman sidestepped. Before Erik could recover, the big man rushed him. Erik dropped the spear just in time, closing both his hands around the wrist that held the cudgel. He twisted savagely, and the strength of his two hands proved enough to force the club out of the huntsman's grip. The guard's size and the force of his charge, though, carried them both to the floor.

They rolled over and over, brawling like two drunkards in a bar fight. The huntsman had the advantage in this style of combat, using his greater weight and strength. Unexpectedly, though, Erik managed to thrust his forearm under the guard's chin against his throat, choking him, and was suddenly able to throw the man onto his back. Then he realized how he had gained his advantage, because the huntsman had dropped his left hand to draw his knife. Erik barely threw himself to his left to avoid the slash of the long blade, the upsweep cutting his coat. The huntsman's big hand closed on Erik's shirtfront and slammed him back onto the floor. The knife blade came up, but the Austrian's flailing hand caught the spear shaft and he rammed the point through leather deep into the guard's vitals. Mortally wounded, the big man's strength flowed away like water, and Erik was able to fling him aside, where he died.

Breathing heavily, Erik rose to his feet. Sweat trickled down his brow, and for a moment he had to lean on the spear for support. Had anyone heard the struggle? No, he concluded, the walls and doors of the manor were too thick for that. It was fortunate; Erik doubted that he could survive another fight like the last.

Tanya came forward from where she had been cowering at the base of the stairs.

"Are you all right?" she asked breathlessly.

"A little out of breath and a bruise or two, luckily. He didn't get the chance to cut me."

"I'm glad," she said, her voice almost a whisper.

Erik smiled at the chestnut-haired girl, then peered down the stairs to the crypt. All was black below, and why not; the dead needed no lights.

"Well, there's no use in waiting," he said. "Tanya, have you ever been down there?"

"No; the guard made me go back when I found this place."

He had thought so.

"All right, then; you stay here while I go down after the Master. Up until now you've been my guide and invaluable, but your part is done. If something goes...wrong, you can back up and he'll never know that you helped me."

Tanya shuddered, and from the way her green eyes flashed Erik thought that he might have an argument on his hands, but at last she chose to give in.

He bent over and took the dead man's knife, thrusting it through his belt, then picked up the lantern off the table.

"I'll need light to see by down there," he explained. "I think there should be enough light filtering down from the chapel so you aren't left in the dark, but if not just wait for me upstairs."

"All right, Erik."

It was the first time she had called him by his Christian name, and it lent him strength as he took the first few steps down into the crypt. This stairway was much narrower and steeper than the previous one, and seemed to go on much farther. Finally, it opened up into a great vaulted room that was much larger than Erik's lantern could illuminate.

The crypt was a massive chamber that, if it had been part of the aboveground structure would have occupied half or more of the space of two floors, for the ceiling was at least twenty feet above Erik's head, supported by massive stone buttresses. In one corner, the wall had cracked, and seepage from belowground water had formed a small pool beneath the jagged break in the stone, but this did not appear to threaten the basic structural integrity of the chamber.

Many stone coffins were inlaid into the floor; the names of Dmitrovich ancestors were carved into the lids of some, while other sarcophagi were left blank, awaiting occupants that had never come. A dank, musty odor filled the air, the dust of centuries mixing with the humidity created by the water seepage. Perspiration stood out on Erik's face as he slowly moved through the room, his footsteps echoing hollowly from the high ceiling.

As Erik made his way across the room, the lantern's rays fell upon what he was sure was the vampire's tomb. It was a wooden coffin, unlike the others in the room, and it was set on a kind of raised dais. The Master's arrogance, he was certain, would demand this place of honor among the dead. He set the lantern down on one of the nearby tombs so he could use two hands for his work. Erik climbed the dais and threw back the lid.

He had been right. The Master lay inside the coffin, dressed just as he had been at dinner. The vampire's eyes were open and staring, causing Erik to jump back in shock, but a second look confirmed that despite his gaze the Master was unmoving, trapped in the comatose sleep of the living corpse he was. The bite on the Austrian's throat seemed to burn like a brand as he stepped up, raised the bloody spear, and plunged the sharp steel point into the monster's breast.

The Master roared in pain and surprise as the attack shattered his slumber. His hand locked around the wooden shaft and ripped the spear out of his chest. Erik barely retained his grip, but was flung off-balance by the creature's strength. His weight on the end of the shaft fought against the supernatural power of the Master's grip, and under the stress of the opposing forces the wood splintered and broke. The vampire was left holding only the last foot or so of the weapon and Erik was sent falling off the edge of the dais and landed heavily on the stone floor.

The vampire rose from his bed and flung the end of the spear aside. Metal screeched as it crashed into stone, reminding Erik of just how desperate his position was. Galvanized, he leapt to his feet despite the pain in his battered body. He reached for the garlic, but found to his horror that his belt pouch was empty, slashed open by the huntsman's knife. He would have to face the vampire hand-to-hand. The Master did not attack him with a weapon, nor did he even fight as a man would have. Instead, he sprang at Erik like a beast, slashing at him with fingernails that had grown into inch-long claws. His face was twisted with insane fury; his snarling mouth revealed fangs that he had not shown at dinner; the vampire was no longer anything resembling an elegant nobleman, but fully the hideous monster he truly was.

The Austrian flung himself aside to avoid the vampire's initial charge, then was able to do so again on the second and third attempt. He knew, though, that it could not go on forever like this; the Master's supernatural strength and quickness would wear down his all-too-human adversary, and not in a long time, either. Had the creature used its intelligence rather than just bestial fury it would be over already; Erik was lucky that, apparently, during the day its intellect seemed to slumber, leaving only animal reflexes to defend itself.

Then, Erik remembered another superstition, one he should have thought of before but which still seemed to offer hope. The Master was crouching for another spring, and Erik could see that his spear had not drawn blood; indeed, though the sharp steel had torn through shirt and waistcoat it had not even left a lasting wound on the undead flesh beneath. He tensed his body, as if to hurl himself aside again like a desperate Spanish matador, but instead, as the vampire launched itself at him, Erik braced the butt of the broken spear on the flagstones. The jagged end met the Master's charge, and with a titanic effort Erik finished the work, impaling the creature on the wooden pole. _Wood._ Only a wooden stake thrust through the heart could render a vampire helpless, not weapons of iron or steel, a fact that apparently held true. It worked with the spear as well; the Master at once resumed the semblance of a corpse without even a cry of pain or anger, losing all animation at once.

Erik drew the knife from his belt, not even pausing to reflect. According to that particular superstition, the stake was only half the task. Once the heart was impaled, the head had to be removed to finish the job.

He was white-faced and trembling when at last he emerged from the crypt.

"Is...is he..." the girl asked.

"The Master of Dmitrovich is destroyed," Erik told her. The memory of the vampire's body rotting to dust and bone haunted his thoughts, as he supposed it would for a long time to come.

"Oh, thank Heaven!" Tanya cried, and flung herself into his arms, holding him tight. Slowly, his arms came up around her, holding the girl to his chest in a close embrace. He could feel the supple curves of her body through the thin dress and the sensation began to banish the fear of his life-and-death struggles.

He had just decided to kiss her when he felt her fangs pierce the skin of his throat.

~X X X~

Tanya Petrovna Dmitrovich looked down at the sleeping form of her latest conquest. She had carried the Austrian back to his room once she had drunk her fill, an easy task for one with her strength. She had been tiring of her previous toy, and had determined to replace him from the moment Erik had stepped into her courtyard, if the young man could unknowingly win a place at her side. Besides which, it was good planning to get a new Master every few decades; it helped keep the peasants guessing. It was a shame to lose Grigori, though, for the huntsman had been an effective servant—but then again, servants of his kind were all too easily found in this bitter country.

As Tanya always did, she wondered if, this time, she should gift her soon-to-be fledgling with her full range of abilities, rather than burdening him with all of the superstitious weaknesses from folklore. Again as always, though, she decided against it. Not only did it insure her the advantage if he turned rebellious, but it was another line of defense against would-be vampire hunters; they would inevitably dismiss her as an innocent victim when they saw her going about in sunlight, freely handling holy items and garlic. She had actually been forced to use the subterfuge one hundred and thirty years past against a particularly resolute invader. With her decoy in place, she could satiate her own bloodthirst without danger.

After all, what peasant would believe that his cruel tyrant and the devil of his nightmares was nothing but the slave of the Mistress of Dmitrovich?


	3. The Clothes Make the Monster

The wolf-tracks we had been following ended at the cobbled surface of the inn-yard. The Gnarled Oak fancied itself a hostelry of some style, despite serving a village of under five hundred souls, and presented its patrons with a higher grade of construction, but it had thwarted our pursuit. Stone did not take the impress of animal feet.

"The tracks don't start up on the far side, Mr. Ray," said Constable Bailey. An experienced huntsman, his eyes were much better than mine, perhaps even than my friend Alanik Ray's when it came to tracking sign.

"Indeed," the elven detective replied. "Then there is only one conclusion to be drawn. Is that not so, Sedgewick?"

I shook my head.

"I'm afraid I don't follow," I said apologetically.

"If it ran into the inn-yard but not out, it went into the inn. Judging by the lack of hysterical screaming, I would further suggest that it reassumed human form before doing so."

"That's no good," Bailey grunted. "Fighting a werewolf's no picnic, especially indoors, and with a crowd of innocent folk on hand it could get ugly in a hurry."

"I concur. The only effective strategy would be to strike instantly and fatally."

"But, Ray," I felt compelled to interject, "we have no idea of what the werewolf looks like, or indeed if it is male or female. Yet it certainly knows us on sight from our previous encounters. All the advantage will be its. It could launch a sneak-attack, take a hostage, attempt to flee, all simply from our inability to confine our attention to a single person among those present."

"Those are all excellent points, Sedgewick, and yet I am afraid we must take the risk. This creature cannot be permitted to play any more of its macabre jokes."

I could not argue with him. To my admittedly limited knowledge a werebeast was a bloodthirsty fiend interested only in tearing apart prey, but this one displayed a sense of perverted humor. It played tricks such as leaving a child's Jack-in-the-box for investigators to find, with the child's head in place of the Jack. A half-dozen equally bloody and sadistic tricks had been played on the people of Thistleford, the reason they had sent to Mordentshire for Ray's expert help.

"If we could ask questions about who came in with whom and when, we might be able to identify the werewolf, but under the circumstances that would only provoke a fight. Simply put, we must identify it in the first moments upon entry."

"Nice trick—if you can do it," grunted Bailey.

"Indeed," Ray agreed, "I do not hold out much hope that I can, but we must make the attempt. We have it cornered, after all, and cannot afford to miss the opportunity."

We ascended the short flight of steps and entered the tavern, a small bell above the door ringing with what seemed to me an ironic cheeriness to announce our presence. Inside, we found the Gnarled Oak to be a typical specimen of Mordentish inndom, with a large common room; a massive hearth to one side in which a steaming cookpot hung; gray, weathered wooden floors; a few small, round tables and a bar along one side. The bartender was a burly man with gray mutton-chop sideburns running along his jowls while the serving maid was moderately pretty in black skirt, white blouse and apron.

This was the setting, in which four customers sat, four possible suspects. Two people sat at separate tables, a woman in a high-necked red velvet dress and a man with a sandy moustache and beard wearing expensive blue silk. At the bar were two more men, one with dark hair, a gray cloak and fleece vest, and a blond fellow with rakish features and fancily embroidered clothes better suited to a Dementlieuse fop.

"Him," Ray said almost before I'd finished taking stock of those present. He gestured towards the cloaked man at the bar. There were no protests, no questions; the man simply launched himself at us. His speed, though, was astonishing. What was worse, I could see his features altering even as he leapt, his jaw twisting and extending into a furred muzzle, his hands becoming lethal claws. I fumbled for my pistol, realizing as I did that I was seconds too late.

Suddenly, though, the detonation of a firearm echoed in my ears. The silver ball from Bailey's gun crashed into the monster's chest and it reeled away with a strangled yelp, cannoning into two of the barstools before falling still. I gave a deep sigh of relief.

"Thank you, Constable," I said from the bottom of my heart.

"Yes, that was excellent marksmanship," Ray agreed. "This night's work will run soundly to your credit."

"Couldn't have done it without you," Bailey shrugged the praise off. "If I hadn't reached for my gun the instant you spoke, he'd have had my throat out. Guess it was worth it, asking you up to help."

"But how did you know, Ray?" I asked. "I saw nothing to set him apart especially from the others."

"Of course you did. Your eye for detail is unfailing. It is only that you do not reason from your observations. Look at the body. See how he is dressed? Woolen trews and cloak, and that fleece vest? When you consider our quarry's morbid sense of humor, who else could he have been but the 'wolf in sheep's clothing'?"

~X X X~

_A/N: As anyone who's read through my works should know by now, I love Sherlock Holmes, and so writing a story of Ravenloft's own Great Detective was virtually inevitable!_


	4. The Tower Besieged

There had been four of us who laid siege, as it were, to Abbot's Tower, four of us whose indignation and righteous wrath had been fired past the point of endurance by the numberless iniquities of its master, Lord Ventnor. It should have been an army, every villager with torch in hand, a force so strong that the hamlet's meager supply of weapons would have been exhausted and the bulk of them forced to arm themselves with rude clubs or farming tools. Father Ashe said we should not begrudge them their fears, though.

"Not only are the diabolic powers of Lord Ventnor's necromancies arrayed against them, but the more practical fears of his armed servants, men little more than brutes well-schooled in violence," he'd pointed out in his fussy yet earnest way. "Besides, it is not right that we go forth with resentment and anger in our hearts towards those who are, in truth, our fellow-victims."

Thus there were only four of us in our company, and perhaps it served to our advantage, for we stole in through a passage leading from the old smugglers' caves on the beach. This obvious evidence of the Ventnors' involvement in the Sweet Trade did not surprise us; indeed, it was quite the most innocuous offense among the charges laid against the lord of Abbot's Tower.

The exit from the passage had been warded by a trap, and our company was reduced to three as a heavy, spiked grill smashed into Constable Perys, crushing him against the stone wall. The clamor brought two men running, weapons in hand, and when Father Ashe stepped forward to abjure them, he went down beneath a studded mace held in one brute's hand.

These losses, however, only roused Jack Gund and I to carry on, and our pistols left the rogues dead upon the floor. What we found in the tower chapel, now hopelessly desecrated, spurred us on the more, and only this can explain the raw courage shown by the blacksmith in the next encounter when, wounded by his much more skillful opponent, he seized two men in his brawny arms and even as he died leapt from the open stair to carry his foes down three stories to the stone-flagged floor below.

This left only myself to press on, and I did so defiantly, bursting into the library atop the tower with a scream of rage. The lord was there, seated in one of the great armchairs before the fire, but so was his right-hand man Hauk, whose name was nearly as black in the village as his master's.

In the next instant our blades clashed, and I was pressed to the utmost by the man's skill and speed, both unusual in one of his size. With the fire of righteous vengeance in my heart, though, I did not falter, the deaths of my companions and the torments of the village below driving me like a thunderbolt. My sword transfixed the man, but it caught up in his body, and when he staggered back to the casement window, then plunged through as he fell against it, he took my weapon with me.

It did not matter. I drew my dagger, a sharp stiletto honed for killing, and thrust at the breast of the withered thing in the chair. Its clawlike hand snapped up and closed on my wrist, then with negligent strength it flipped me backwards into the chair opposite it.

"Do have a seat," Lord Ventnor told me with a wry twist of his virtually lipless mouth. "Brandy?" he offered, gesturing to a bottle on the sideboard. "No? Well, on to business, then."

I could only sit, stunned and staring at the old man. His grip had had the strength of a fiend's, and my wrist still felt the impress of his fingers, which had numbed the flesh to paralysis with a chill not of the grave but of the outer darkness beyond. The dagger had fallen harmlessly to the carpet, though I doubted there would be any point in retrieving it.

"You are a righteous avenger, are you not? Driven to avenge my countless iniquities with violence?" He chuckled dryly. "Thanks to you and your friends, I seem to have quite the servant problem. Well, it's a lesson to me. I should have moved on long before now. I generally never let things get to the point where unruly mobs come after me. I just so _enjoyed_ myself here. Did you know that some of the secret rooms underneath this tower are older than I am? I actually felt a thrill of horror—me!—at some of the things I'd discovered. Really, I daresay you lot would have been no worse if I'd let Lord Ventnor have his own way with you."

He spoke of the lord as if he was a third person, and yet it was Lord Ventnor's withered tongue that spoke the words. His speech made no sense; it was gibbering madness.

"Still, all things mortal must come to an end, mustn't they? If witch-hunters are beating down my door, then it is definitely time to leave."

He rose from his seat and walked towards me. His rheumy blue eyes held mine firmly, and I could not move; my limbs had no power in them. His hands gripped my shoulders and his jaw opened, revealing shrunken gums embracing teeth longer and sharper than were natural. He bent his head, and I felt the spike of hot pain as he tore into my throat. I could not even scream ad the old man guzzled greedily at my wound. My senses swam from blood loss, and my vision clouded as he raised his head once more, the gore-stained lips curved in a smile. He then pierced his neck with his nails and a bubbling black froth welled up in the wound. He bent down and cupped the back of my neck, forcing my mouth against the wound. I could not say I drank; I simply had no strength, was no more than a vessel into which he poured what was my own blood, only tainted with the vile thing that had inhabited the body of Lord Ventnor.

~X X X~

It was a bit less than an hour by my reckoning when I finally found the strength to move. There was always a period of transition while my mind takes root, absorbs what was already within the shell. I stood and stretched, feeling the youth and vigor of my new home, comparing it pleasantly with the withered corpse of Lord Ventnor that now lay upon the hearthrug. The force of my limbs is always substantial, but there is a joy to savor in the flex of young, strong muscles that possess energy of their own.

That done, I retrieved my fallen dagger and resheathed it, then fetched a satchel. Into this I put the rarest and most potent of the books and grimoires from the library, some of which I'd had that long-ago day when Lord Ventnor had met me for the first time and some which I'd found here in Abbot's Tower's library. I hadn't been lying about the nature of the Ventnors. I moved aside a brick in the hearth and from the hidden recess took out several jewels and a supply of gold. Acquiring money had never been my problem, but it was always better to begin a journey with adequate traveling funds.

As my last act I splashed the brandy liberally about the worm-eaten books that weighed down the shelves and set them alight with a spill from the fire. By the time I reached the border of the estate park, Abbot's Tower was an inferno, a raging column of fire. I turned and watched it burn for a while, savoring the irony. After all, "I" had come to Abbot's Tower this evening to end the accursed hold of the Ventnor family upon the village, and though one might quibble about the precise methods, I could hardly deny that the aim had been fully accomplished.


	5. Ill Met at the Station

_A/N: As will soon become apparent, this is another "Masque of the Red Death" story, set on Gothic Earth rather than in Ravenloft proper._

~X X X~

Flakes of snow swirled and danced in the bitter wind as they fell in ever-increasing number. The storm was fierce enough and the hour so late that the stationmaster at Vaseria had feared for the Goldstadt train, but at last the engine and its carriages had rattled into the small station, an hour late but safe and sound.

Only two passengers had disembarked, a gentleman wearing English country tweeds beneath his greatcoat and a tall woman whose form was muffled beneath a rich wool traveling cloak. At first the stationmaster took them for a father and daughter, but as they approached he realized the man was no older than his early thirties. It was his stooped posture, the way he leaned on his gold-capped stick, and the shakiness of his limbs that had fooled the trainman, but on closer examination it was clear from the haggard though youthful features and sunken eyes that it was illness, not age that caused the man's infirmity.

"Pardon me, sir," the traveler said in heavily accented but fluent German, "has the express passed through already?"

"It has, twenty minutes ago and on schedule."

The ill man sighed heavily.

"I was afraid of that. I'm sorry, Eve; we've missed our connection."

"We cannot help the weather," she replied. She had no accent, and the stationmaster wondered if her companion—husband?—spoke German to her so as not to be rude to the third party or because it was her native tongue. "And it is not as if anyone is waiting for our arrival."

"There will be another express tomorrow," the stationmaster supplied helpfully.

"Well, then, we shall simply have to stay the night," the man concluded. "Can you suggest an inn?"

"The Crown, I think, would be best suited."

"Thank you. I suppose that—" He broke off suddenly, interrupted by a spasm of coughing that wracked his frame. He clutched a handkerchief to his lips while he fought off the bout, and when he brought it away the stationmaster could see blood. Probably the man was consumptive, the trainman decided with a pang of sympathy.

"Charles, why don't you go inside?" Eve suggested, laying a hand lightly on his arm. "I'll see to the offloading of our baggage; you need to be out of this cold and wind."

"I'll get you a cup of coffee," offered the stationmaster. "I always keep a pot ready on nights like this."

"Thank you; I'd be very grateful," Charles replied. "I hate to be such a bother to you both—"

"Nonsense," Eve and the stationmaster said at once, then glanced at each other with smiles at the unintended humor. She was not beautiful, he decided, but handsome—a woman of character. A gust of wind lifted her brown curls away from her neck, and he caught sight of a long, angry red scar curling around from her throat nearly to the base of her ear. Small wonder, then, that she so easily sympathized with her Charles's pain.

"I can see there's no getting around it, then," the Englishman gave in with good grace, and followed the stationmaster off the platform and into Vaseria's little station.

Only then did three additional travelers descend from the train's last carriage. The lead man smiled with satisfaction, nodded towards Eve, and said something to his companions. Both were broad-faced men in shabby caps and overcoats, not at all the kind of person who usually associated with well-dressed gentlemen. They nodded, and from capacious pockets one produced a wicked knife and the other a sap. They advanced towards the woman purposefully while their leader proceeded to the station.

Inside the station, the Englishman had seated himself and was warming his hands gratefully before a pot-bellied stove while the stationmaster was out arranging for someone to take the travelers and their luggage to the Crown. Charles had already taken his first sips from the tin cup of coffee he'd been given and found the strong beverage to warm him agreeably from within as the stove did from without. It was with some irritation, then, that he looked up when the platform door opened to let in a cold draft.

"Dr. Charles Franks?" the newcomer addressed him in English. Franks observed a tall man in a dark suit and coat with a lean, patrician face beneath a high hat.

"You have the advantage of me, sir."

The gentleman removed his hat to show thinning white hair and swept Franks a Continental bow.

"Permit me to introduce myself. My name is Professor Gustav Klein, of Zurich. The hour is late and my business pressing, so I shall be direct and to the point. You have something I want, Dr. Franks."

"I beg your pardon?"

"Come now, no dissembling. You flinched most tellingly before your offended response; you know what I mean."

"I assure you that I do not."

Professor Klein tsked as if at an erring student.

"Must I speak openly of it? Ah, but by your so-stubborn expression I see that I must. You recently journeyed to Goldstadt, where your family originally hails from. You spent nearly two months at your family's schloss. A man suffering from tuberculosis does not undertake such a journey for any but the most serious reasons, particularly during the winter months. But then, you had good reason."

Franks glared angrily at the professor.

"And what reason would that be?"

"Why, a cure for your otherwise incurable condition, of course. Your grandfather was brilliant, beyond brilliant. His research into the fundamental energies of life transcended disease theory to the extent that, turned to the proper ends, his theories might at least offer hope towards sustaining life in even the most ravaged body."

"You weave a most intriguing tale." Franks's hands worked convulsively, rubbing over the handle of his stick.

"Spare me these games!" Klein barked. "I want your grandfather's records! I permitted you to retrieve them because they were well-hidden and I could hardly conduct a proper search through burglary. You have them with you—journals, records, experimental notes. The details of a genius so elevated that it became infamy, an infamy that prompted your father to Anglicize his name upon emigration so he would not carry the ill-repute of being the son of Victor _Frankenstein_."

Franks cringed as if a blow had been struck and glared up at Professor Klein with a burning hatred.

"You have been spying on me!"

"Hardly that, Doctor. Research, if you will."

"You poked and pried into my movements, my family background, and you expect me to share my grandfather's research with you?"

"You will do so."

"I will _not_."

"You will." Klein held up a hand to forestall further argument. "I expected your reaction, of course, and took precautions. Threats of bodily harm would be pointless against a dying man—"

"You are correct," Franks said grimly. "I am well-accustomed to torture already."

"—but what of your sweet wife? She cares for you deeply, and you her, else she would not have accompanied you on such a grim journey. I have two associates who are most familiar with personal violence. Even now they have arranged for your wife's...accommodations...until you are in a more cooperative frame of mind."

Franks smiled.

"You have kidnapped her?"

"To use a crude term, yes."

Franks did not respond as the professor was expecting. Anger, fear, denial, these would all have been reasonable reactions. By no means, however, did Klein anticipate laughter. Franks chuckled, then gave way to hysterical cackling that made his whole body shake convulsively.

"What is this?" Klein demanded. "What are you doing?"

"Your threat is an empty shell, Professor," said the Englishman between gasps for breath. "That woman is not my wife!"

"Do not try such a pathetic trick. You and she were observed arriving together in Goldstadt."

"Oh, my wife arrived with me, Professor. She would not have let me undertake such a journey alone in my state of health." He laughed again, this time with bitterness. "But it was her health she should have been concerned for, Professor Klein. A flight of half-rotted stairs collapsed beneath her, and she died. My...current companion has my wife's face. Indeed, she has my wife's entire head! And if I try hard enough, I can sometimes imagine that it is my wife's soul that looks out of Eve's eyes."

Reflexively, Klein took a step backwards. Even without Franks's words, the expression on the man's face would have instilled fear. It was the expression of a madman.

"You...cannot mean..."

The door to the platform swung open.

"Charles, are you all right?" Eve cried frantically.

Smears of red stained her pale kid gloves.

Klein backed away again.

"Yes," Franks said quietly. "Professor Klein was just leaving."

The professor took the implied offer at once, bolting through the door and vanishing into the swirling snow.

Eve came and sat down next to Franks.

"There were two men on the platform. They thought that I was..."

"I know. They worked for Klein."

She reached for his hand, laced her fingers together with his.

"I wish they had been right."


End file.
